Jimmy Savile's lone visits to morgue

Stoke Mandeville Hospital is investigating Jimmy Savile's lone visits to its morgue. The hospital, where Savile is alleged to have sexually assaulted children, is conducting a probe into concerns that he may have "interacted inappropriately" with corpses.

The Sun reports a 1990 interview with Savile in which he spoke of his pleasure in being around dead bodies. In the interview, Savile described being alone with dead people as:

...a privilege and an honour. Some people get hold of the fact that Jim likes looking after cadavers and say, ‘Aha, Jim’s a necrophiliac!’ I’m not a necrophiliac.

The unprompted denial of necrophilia closely mirrors Savile's repeated unprompted denials of paedophilia. In a documentary Savile claimed he told people he "hated children" in order to put "them off the hunt".

We have been shocked to hear of the very serious allegations about Jimmy Savile. We continue to cooperate fully with the police.

We have no record of any complaints of this nature and would have taken swift and decisive action if this had formally been raised with us.

The Daily Mail also reports a source from Broadmoor, the high security psychiatric hospital, who says Savile was fascinated with dead bodies.

A senior member of the Prison Officers Association said of Savile at Broadmoor:

Savile had the run of the place. He would walk into the most secure areas containing the most dangerous patients in the UK. He had friends in high places in Broadmoor and they swept concerns about him under the carpet.

Savile also had access to the morgue at Leeds General Infirmary, where he worked as a volunteer porter.